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VLC for Windows 8 reaches $65,000 funding goal on Kickstarter with five days to spare

A Metro version of VLC, the popular free and open-source media player, is coming to Windows 8. On Sunday, the VideoLAN organization reached its funding goal on Kickstarter for its Windows 8-specific app. There are also plans to port it afterwards to Windows Phone 8.

The project has now been funded by over 2,500 backers, who have pledged more than the £40,000 ($65,000) goal. Yet there are still five days left, meaning the project could hit £45,000 or may be even £50,000 ($81,000).

We contacted the non-profit organization to find out what was inside. VLC developer Felix Paul Kühne got back to us promptly to say that “the update in question is only about thanks to our backers, that we are enormously proud to have passed the goal because of them and that we are going to share more ideas we’d like to reach within this project shortly.” While he revealed some of the ideas to us, he isn’t yet ready to announce them on Kickstarter, but likely will next Saturday when the Kickstarter project closes.

VLC’s Windows 7 version will naturally run on Windows 8, but not on Windows RT. The goal of the project is to “take our existing code, which already works on Windows 8’s ‘desktop mode’, and make it run on WinRT, the ‘Metro’ interface” according to the Kickstarter page. When the project reached the 70 percent funding mark, the team shared two mockups for the app.

Here’s the pitch:

Similar to the desktop version of VLC media player, you will be able to play all files, all your discs and all your network streams. All of that in a native, beautiful and easy-to-use interface.

In contrast to the built-in media player, VLC for Windows 8 we intend to add support for DVDs and VCDs out-of-the box as well as unencrypted Blu-Rays. All the features known from our current releases will be retained like a full fledged equalizer, video filters and superior support for subtitles.

We will pursue a fully-compliant app for submission to the Windows Store in order to reach as many users as possible, and to provide a consistent installation and update experience.